The hosts seemed very taciturn when we arrived but quickly forgotten when we saw the apartment. It was very nice, modern and roomy - with outdoor and indoor dining facilities I was very impressed. Also, the location was good with handy access to both the beach and the swimming complex. The only problem was a lack of car parks - but we were able to manage.
However, one night, my daughter and I were picked up by friends and taken out for the night. I was telephoned by the host and asked to return immediately as my car was parked in their only handicapped park and a lady in a wheelchair was unable to get to her apartment.
I was horrified as I hadn't seen any signage and would never do such a thing. My friend kindly offered to race me back to move the car. When I arrived I was roundly abused by both the hosts and handicapped guests. All reasonable you would think until I backed out the car and found there was NO SIGNAGE WHATSOEVER. Nor had I been warned to keep the park clear at any point in time.
I was furious, but held off saying anything due to the number of people around and high level of tension. However, my evening with friends was ruined and when I checked out and advised the host of how unhappy I was about the situation, the response was "Oh well".
Normally I would rate cleanliness and location as more important than service - but this sort of abuse I would not recommend that anyone subject themselves to.

Terrible attitude of host in Boatshed apartments!!

We are a family of two adults and two children ages 9 and 7. We stayed at boatshed just for one night and received a terrible treatment by the hosts there. They entered in the apartment without permission while we were still there and started to get our luggage and personal belongings putting them out of the place just because we were 20 minutes over the check out time. They materially kicked us out of the apartment like dogs.

We first visited the apartments and decided to look for other options because we considered them rather pricey and isolated. Thus we checked out almost every other accommodation in Mt. Maunganui finding several better, more convenient and cheaper options. However we got back to Boatshed just because, due to the high season, most of the alternatives were already booked.

The boatshed apartments are new and well equipped in terms of furniture and appliances. On the other hand, are pretty far away and isolated from the City centre, so not very convenient if you don’t have a car.

But the worst thing of this place is the treatment we received from its hosts. When we arrived in the evening we hired the room for one night and informed them that perhaps we’d stay for another two nights depending essentially on the weather conditions. They confirmed the apartment was available for up to three additional nights.

The following morning at 10:10 a.m. the man came informing us that the weather forecast was rain in the entire northern Island and hurried us up to make a decision on the additional nights because the check out time was 10:00 a.m. We told him we were not informed about such an early check out time, but confirmed we were leaving in 20 or 25 minutes maximum, minimum time required for us to finish up with our breakfast. He said it was ok but asked us to hurry up.

Surprisingly, the woman appeared 3 minutes later accompanied with a maid, entered in the apartment with bad manners and started to put all our belongings away with the excuse that they had to clean because they were receiving someone in the next few minutes. She even took the toasts of our children out of the dishes throwing those on to the table and on the floor. She was touching all our personal belongings including wallets, cameras, even the food in the fridge, etc on the worst treatment we have ever received on a hotel.

We have been travelling around the world for the past 5 months visiting more than 20 countries and staying in more than 50 hotels and never ever saw such a similar attitude and conduct, which we consider, irresponsible, indecorous and inadmissible for any host or establishment.

We have just returned from our fantastic trip to New Zealand, where we stayed for 5 nights at the Boatshed, a lesser-known accommodation in an area known mostly as a Kiwi summer resort. We as Americans were an anomaly, at least in the shoulder springtime season of October, and we were approached several times by warm yet curious New Zealanders, who spoke loudly at us because I guess our American-accented English was nearly unintelligible to them.
The Boatshed was a perfect retreat for us after 32 hours of flying and several time/date changes. Also, the weather was rainy for the first two days, precluding a lot of planned outdoor activities and drawing us closer into our cosy digs there. We were glad we had decided on the "Penthouse" room, at the top of the main building which is like a large house and is in a residential area a block from the beach. The whole place is only 7 years old and seems brand new. The rate was comparable to others with a fraction of facilities and charm. The apartment had a semi-separate bedroom with queen bed and a twin daybed in the living room (lounge) area, which also contained a comfy couch and easy chairs perfect for collapsing in front of the satellite TV, or surfing on the internet with the excellent wireless. The kitchen had even a dishwasher, as well as stove, microwave and decent-sized fridge, all new stainless steel. There was an electric kettle and press (plunge) pot for coffee. All of the dishes, etc. were new and matched the tasteful, colorful modern decor. There was a glass-topped dining table as well, and a wraparound concrete deck with grill and nice deck furniture. The views were everywhere out big picture windows and doors, 270 degrees of the neighborhood out to the mountains, surf beach and Mt. Maunganui itself, which made the whole place an ever-changing show and also let in the welcome sunshine upon its rare appearances. You could see it would be a great beach house when summer came and you could open it all up to the outdoors. The apartment had full housekeeping; even my drying dishes were put away each day. We did not mind it, but there are a lot of stairs to climb to reach that top floor. There are other rooms below with fewer or no stairs, all described on their website.
Hosts Ken and Rae were very welcoming and always cleaning or doing something around the place to keep it so nice. Rae is a former tour guide, and both are great sources of local info. We saw hardly any other guests during our stay, although the hotel was full much of the time. The main part of town is not far, but you will need a car to get to all but 2 restaurants, grocery store and activities. We used the Boatshed as our base for exploring Rotorua, Whakatane and White Island, and the local landmarks - see my Traveler List::

The 12 Days of New Zealand for more.